"It's the beginning of the adventure"- Ferrari's racing director on how budget cap is 'constraining' top F1 teams

Ferrari's sporting director Laurent Mekies has said that the budget cap is an entirely new challenge that needs to be tackled by the team.

Mekies talked about how the budget cap acts as a huge constraint, especially for a team like Ferrari, which is renowned as one of the biggest spenders in the history of the sport.

In an interview with Racingnews365, the Ferrari sporting director said:

"Yes, the level of the constraint is huge. It is not finished because, as you know, there are various steps in the budget cap, and then you also have the new cars, they came into the equation.

He also added:

"I think it's the beginning of the adventure, because the real discussion is not about the numbers of the cost cap, or how much (it) is going up by, or if it is going up with inflation, or the plan reductions.

One key question mark that Ferrari are admittedly still worried about is the policing of the budget gap. Earlier in the season, team principal Mattia Binotto had raised questions about that. Mekies also voiced his concern about the new regulations, saying:

"There is one key factor: policing. For us as a sport, it took years and years and years, and decades, to mature the regulations, and you have something that is massively constraining the top teams. Therefore, the level of policing you need to have on that is extremely high."

Mekies earlier used to be a part of the engineering unit before transitioning to his current role. He feels that the transition is a 'natural' one, citing a few examples from the current grid. He said:

"Although you may see that there are not so many examples, it is quite (a) natural switch, because today's sport is all as one; you are used to dealing with regulations on the technical sides, so it is a fairly natural switch. There was Sam Michael (formerly of Williams and McLaren), there was also Alan Permane in Alpine."

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Laurent Mekies is now Ferrari racing director

Laurent Mekies added that his role has evolved into a race director role, and Inaki Rueda (head of race strategy) will take over the sporting advisory committee. Mekies talked about how even Rueda has come from an engineering background, just like him, saying:

"I'm a racing director and (head of race strategy). Inaki Rueda is now participating in the sporting advisory committee. He's the guy representing us there and doing sporting events, and he has also come from an engineering background."

He added:

"It's about being involved, trying to learn, trying to contribute to the sport that we love, and it is a fantastic thing to be able to do it on different parts of the wall."

Ferrari currently trail Red Bull by 97 points in the championship and will hope to make a strong statement after the summer break.